In the Verdant Stone Realm, deep within the Crimson Phoenix Empire's southern Crimson Cloud Province—once ruled by the Scarlet Soul Sect, there lay a valley cloaked in haunting silence. Once a thriving sect headquarters, now it stood abandoned. The buildings and market stalls that once buzzed with life were now little more than empty ruins.
And within those empty ruins stood a modest teahouse—nothing grand. Just a weathered wooden building with a single upright table, its surroundings scorched and lifeless. The stall owner had long since fled... or died. The only sound that remained was the occasional whistle of wind from outside.
A young man sat alone inside, plainly dressed, sipping lukewarm tea from a chipped bowl.
His pitch-black hair, once lustrous, was tied back with a torn piece of cloth. The hem of his robe was stained with dried blood.
His eyes, calm yet heavy, carried the weight of sleepless months.
His name was Ye Wuji.
And he was supposed to be dead.
A year ago, he'd been an outer disciple of the Scarlet Soul Sect—a rising talent not for his cultivation prowess, but for his unmatched versatility and survival instincts.
Puppetry, corpse-refining, poison arts, gu refining, shadow arts, illusions, disguises, herbalism... he dabbled in them all.
His cultivation talent was mediocre. But his ability to survive? Exceptional.
Yet when disaster came, talent and versatility proved little defense.
The sect's Ancestor had attempted to break through from the Late Origin Spirit Ninth Stage to the Nascent Soul Realm, but failed. And his death shattered the balance, drawing the wrath of five righteous sects.
In a single month, the once-feared Scarlet Soul Sect was wiped from the land. Its mountains burned. Its treasures plundered. Its disciples hunted like dogs.
Ye Wuji only survived because he was small, unimportant—a Fifth Stage Qi Refining worm among dragons.
He gently placed the bowl down, his gaze drifting skyward.
Even now, in the quiet of day, he could feel it… the silent loathing of heaven and earth.
As a demonic cultivator, the very laws of the world rejected his existence.
His breakthroughs were harder. His tribulations fiercer. And still, he persisted.
"I've lasted a year," he murmured. "A year since the fall. Maybe... it's time."
As if summoned by those words, a figure stepped cautiously into the teahouse, eyes scanning the empty space before approaching.
"Senior Brother... Ye Wuji?" the man whispered.
Ye Wuji didn't move. "Speak."
The newcomer sat opposite him, leaning in with forced familiarity. His eyes twitched, his face a little too clean for a true fugitive.
"Ye-ge," he said, voice oily. "It's me—Xiao Ren. From the talisman hall."
Ye Wuji inhaled slowly.
Xiao Ren had vanished during the siege. Rumors claimed, that he fled with treasures from the inner treasury. Ye Wuji had assumed him dead—or worse, captured and broken by the righteous sects.
"I sent a signal," Xiao Ren said quickly. "I had to be careful. But I wanted to let you and other survivors know that I'm alive too."
Ye Wuji took a sip of tea. "And?"
"I want to rebuild the sect," Xiao Ren said, voice dropping to a whisper. "You and me. We gather any survivors and start anew."
Ye Wuji's fingers tapped the side of his ceramic bowl rhythmically. "Then tell me, do you have any blood essence crystals? And our sect's Blood-Shadow Step manual?"
"Yes. I do," Xiao Ren said eagerly. "But I've hidden them. There's a cave near the old Stone Willow Spring. That's where I plan to rebuild the sect."
Ye Wuji stood up.
"Go there, alone. I don't want to join you in this. I'll act separately."
Xiao Ren blinked in confusion. "What? No, senior brother, it's safe! I—"
Ye Wuji's dagger was at his throat in a flash.
"You smell of sandalwood," Ye Wuji said coldly. "Most righteous sects burn it during their oath ceremonies. Did you forgot to change your robes?"
Xiao Ren's eyes widened, but far too late. The blade slid cleanly upward.
Ye Wuji sighed.
"What now... Still no blood essence crystals. If this keeps up, mine cultivation starts regressing."
He searched Xiao Ren's body, found his storage bag, and immediately after taking it, he disappeared from the scene, leaving the body there.
|>>======|✦|======<<|
Back in his hiding place, in a cave concealed behind a waterfall not far from the scene he fled from.
Ye Wuji sat cross-legged, holding the bloodstained storage bag.
As expected, it was sealed with a spiritual imprint.
He placed both hands on it, sending a strand of Qi into the bag to begin erasing the former imprint and imprinting his own.
Hours passed. Finally, the last trace of Xiao Ren's spiritual imprint hissed and faded.
Ye Wuji replaced it with his own and looked inside.
Thousands of low-grade spirit crystals, hundreds of medium-grade ones, and seventeen high-grade spirit crystals glimmered in the darkness.
There were pills. Materials. Jade slips filled with imprinted cultivation methods, martial techniques, and auxiliary arts.
Among them: the Scarlet Soul Sect's Qi Refining method he already practiced—the Scarlet Soul Blood-Refining Art, but more importantly, two manuals he had long desired:
Blood-Shadow Step and Soul-Devouring Claw techniques.
He let out a cold chuckle. "So, in the end he lied even about those things."
And in the corner of the storage bag were also nestled some blood essence crystals, that he urgently needed.
There were just enough of them to prevent his cultivation from regressing.
Among them was also hidden a flying shuttle artifact... and one more thing.
A strange object that made him furrow his brows.
A black lotus-shaped artifact with no spiritual imprint, no inscriptions and no obvious aura.
Except for its gorgeous appearance it looked utterly normal.
He took it out intrigued, turning it over in his hands and sending a thread of Qi into it, but nothing happened. It showed no reaction.
That puzzled him.
So, he made a small cut on his finger and let a single drop of his blood essence fall onto the lotus.
The moment it touched the surface…
…the world around him shattered.
And Ye Wuji collapsed, unconscious.